Page - 366 - in Loss and Damage from Climate Change - Concepts, Methods and Policy Options

366 J.HandmerandJ.Nalau andDamage in thePacificSmall IslandDevelopingStates (SIDS).1 It alsoprovides a commentary regarding the risk andoptions space in aPacificSIDScontextwhere manyofthelivelihoodactivitiesaresubsistence-based,reliantonthecurrentclimate, and seriously disrupted by extreme weather events. We use the case of Tropical CyclonePamthat hitVanuatu inMarch2015, thefirst recordedcategory5cyclone in the country, to illustrate someof thepoints of this global debate. Indoing sowe take the climate risk and adaptation capacity analysis in IPCC’s fifth assessment report (AR5) toanother levelofdetail (for thechapteron theSIDS, seeNurseet al. 2014). Oneof theconceptual frameworks to illustrateLossandDamage(L&D)as inte- gratedintoaclimateriskmanagementframeworkhasbeenproposedbyMechlerand Schinko (2016) drawing onNurse et al. (2014) andUNFCCC(2015). This frame- workhasbeenapplied to thegroupofSIDSglobally (see chapter bySchinkoet al. 2018). It focusesoncurrent riskexposureand future risk scenarioswhere the intol- erable risk space is seen as being relevant already today and becoming evenmore critical in themedium to longer term (2030–40 and 2080–2100).We discuss how for somePacificSIDS, there are already caseswhere communities find themselves impactedbyintolerableclimate-relatedrisk,andwheretheriskmanagementoptions suggested in thegraphicarealreadybeingdeployed (seeFig.15.2). MechlerandSchinko’sargument is forabroad-basedriskmanagementapproach including both ‘standard’ and transformativeDRR (Disaster Risk Reduction) and CCA(ClimateChangeAdaptation)actionsaswellasoptions.Under theirapproach, support, including funding, would be allocated on the basis of current needs for dealingwithclimatevariabilityandchange,aswellasattributionof lossesanddam- ages to anthropogenic climate change.At the global level attribution, for example in regards to sea level rise, canbequantifiedathigh levelsof confidence (see IPCC 2014). However, in the Pacific Island countries observed change is amix of both globalaswellas localenvironmentalchanges,decliningcropyieldandfishresource reliability,aswellasdemographicandsocio-economicfactors. Inthesecountrycon- texts, theoptionsspacemayalsobeveryconstrained,asmanypeopleinPacificSIDS have subsistence or semi-subsistence livelihoods, and national economies are very narrowlybased.For example, themajorityofPacificSIDSbase their economieson tourismandforeignaid(KuruppuandWillie2015).However, transformativeaction mightbepossibleandisoccurringslowlyforexamplethroughmigratingortravelling to takeseasonalworkelsewhere, and through remittances. 15.1.1 TheSouth-WestPacific TheSouth-West Pacific region (see Fig. 15.1 on the South Pacific) is increasingly recognisedasthemostimmediatelyvulnerableregiontopotentialmassmigrationand relocationduetoclimatechangeimpacts(Campbell2008;McAdam2012;Weirand 1Where the termSIDSisused it ismostly referring toPacificSmall IslandDevelopingStates.